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Corporate “Legacies”, “Bequests”, “Endowments” And “Partnerships” Are Pathways to Privatization And Commercialization

The Bill Is Actually Worse Than Gov. Christie’s Parks Privatization Policy

The Privatization Scandals At Liberty State Park Would Be Expanded Statewide 

[Update: 6/13/22 – Highly unusual last minute agenda change – this bill is up TODAY! Smith POSTED BILL ~~~ end update]

SMITH APPARENTLY HELD BILL. Amazing, because the groups involved brought us the “Stewardship” nightmare and stole parks funding. See this garbage:

S1311 (attached) is up for a Senate Environment Committee vote on Thursday.  … PPA, NJCF and NJLCV have various concerns about the Bill, including an obvious concern about raising funds for so-called stewardship that includes mechanized logging. Groups will be reaching out to Senator Smith asking that the bill be held until there can be further discussions. There are several unintended consequences (or perhaps, intended consequences) that may emerge throughout the Bill.  I will be requesting that Senator Smith hold the bill at least until the NJFTF has concluded its business.

NJ Senate Democrats are supporting legislation purported to generate funding for State Parks via creation of a New Jersey State Parks and Forests Foundation (hit the link to read the bill, S1311, Turner).

Before we get to what the bill would do, we need to remind readers of four important things about generating funds for State Parks and Forests:

1) hundreds of millions of dollars of previously Constitutionally dedicated funding for State Parks was stolen by the Green Mafia’s “Keep It Green” open space campaign. Remember this?

State Parks Director Texel’s devastating words – he wrote:

As the Director of the NJ State Park Service now coping with the reality that our entire Parks capital budget will be completely eliminated beginning July 1, 2015 as a result of the YES vote I can say this is the darkest day I have faced in my professional career. Worse than Superstorm Sandy.

2) Legislation enacted way back in 2008, seeking to generate parks funding, mandated that DEP collect market based lease and concession revenues – including for billion dollar generating energy infrastructure like pipelines and electric transmission lines – is not being implemented, see:

• Murphy DEP Continues Christie DEP State Parks Concessions Policy

3) DEP still is collecting only pennies on the dollar in public compensation for Natural Resource Damages, funds that could go to State Parks. As a result, NJ’s corporate polluters have evaded billions of dollars of NRD liability -and they even killed Senator Smith’s Legislative Taskforce on NRD standards. For that story, see:

• Big Corporate Polluters Quietly Veto Natural Resource Damage Compensation Standards

4) If Senator Turner seeks to serve her constituents, maybe she should consider creating a new Delaware Riverfront State Park at Duck Island. A land donation and unwinding PSE&G’s recent sale of the Duck Island power plant to a warehouse developer in order to support development of a new urban waterfront State Park on Duck Island would be a small gesture of reciprocity by PSE&G.

Now, let’s get to what the bill would do.

Under various guises and slogans – from “Stewardship” to “Partnerships” – the bill actually would lead to privatization, commercialization, and even industrial development of State Parks and Forests. Here’s how:

Broad Contract Powers With Little Oversight

The bill provides broad powers to the New Jersey State Parks and Forests Foundation to enter into contracts, with virtually unfettered discretion, no competitive bidding, and no public participation or oversight:

Among many other potential abuses, this contract power could be a stealth maneuver to authorize participation in various market based carbon credit and trading schemes, under the guise of “carbon sequestration” in NJ forests.

DEP staff to the Forest Task Force have already admitted that DEP is working on joining the failed California carbon credit scheme, expanding RGGI to allow carbon credit generation, and even participating in purely private carbon credit markets and trading schemes, like currently underway at billionaire Peter Kellogg’s Hudson Farm in the Highlands forests. As we recently wrote, current Murphy DEP Assistant Commissioner For Parks And Forests John Cecil was actually paid as a consultant to write Kellogg’s Forest Management Plan.

In addition to broad contract powers, Section 4 of the bill provides the following powers to the New Jersey State Parks and Forests Foundation:

Partnerships:

to enter into partnerships with qualifying tax exempt nonprofit organizations or local government units for the development, including stewardship, of lands preserved for recreation and conservation purposes.

I’m sure there are billionaire’s and large corporations willing to enter into a “Partnership” with a friendly NGO and DEP to fund things like golf courses in Liberty State Park (just look at NJ Audubon’s “Corporate Stewardship” program for examples. Sustainable NJ and NJ Future, NGO’s, also have corporate Stewardship programs).

It’s called “Pay-to-Play”.

I’m sure there are many billionaires and corporations who are willing to pony up millions of dollars for “legacy” naming rights (Walmart Long Beach Island State Park!), or make million dollar “bequests” for all sorts of commercialization and privatization proposals, from marina’s to canoe rentals. “Comcast State Park”. “PSE&G Plaza” – think of the endless commercial possibilities! Woohoo!

Industrialization

We’ve already seen a huge proliferation of industrial scale solar facilities sited in NJ’s vanishing farms and forests.

The bill would expand on that solar technology, to include wind, geothermal, or virtually any absurd “renewable energy” (including biomass from logging) in State Parks and Forests:

(4) in consultation with the Commissioner of Environmental Protection, to develop and oversee opportunities for the construction and operation of renewable energy generation systems at State parks and forests

Unlimited Outdoor Recreation

Can you imagine how this power could be abused? Off Road Vehicle Parks as “outdoor recreation”?

to advise the Department of Environmental Protection concerning the preparation of master plans and management plans prepared by the department for each State park and forest pursuant to section 5 of P.L.1983, c.324 (C.13:1L-5) in order to enhance outdoor recreational activities and programs within State parks and forests for the benefit of the State’s citizens;

Patronage Jobs

And the cherry on top is patronage: staff are exempt from Civil Service requirements:

Gibbstown “Cavern” On Former Dupont Site “Repurposed” To Store LNG Export Gas 

“Climate change impact assessment” limited to adaptation, not greenhouse gas emissions

No enforceable standards apply to greenhouse gas emissions

This is what “regulatory capture” looks like

Climate change impacts do not include the climate impacts of greenhouse gas emissions from or associated with the facility.

The “climate change impact statement” and DEP permit review provisions of the proposal lack any standards to deny a permit on the basis of climate impacts.

Today, the Murphy DEP proposed new regulations that would govern DEP permitting of new and existing facilities for the underground storage of natural gas and other petroleum products.

I suspect that DEP will spin these rules as updating or modernizing outdated permits or regulations based on an ancient 1951 law. DEP will use the LNG restriction to obfuscate and divert.

But make no mistake, just the opposite is the case: in fact, the proposed rules effectively promote expansion of fossil infrastructure, protect existing permits, and continue a dangerous practice that should be banned.

Underground storage caverns are part of the fossil infrastructure network. Although DEP fails to even mention this or analyze the need for this infrastructure capacity, California regulators analyze the need for storage capacity and explain the role of underground storage:

[The folks at Delaware Riverkeeper played the inside DEP game and got duped. DRN actually supported the development of regulations, instead of just opposing the need for this practice and seeking decommissioning of existing caverns and a ban on expansion or promotion of new fossil infrastructure. Remarkably, they did this despite noting that the Gibbstown LNG project was seeking expansion of the current cavern capacity of 186,000 barrels to 3 million barrels! ]

According to the DEP proposal:

The proposed new rules will apply to systems that are used for the underground storage of any natural or artificial gas, or any petroleum product or derivative of any petroleum product, with the exception of liquefied natural gas (LNG), as discussed below, and will govern the construction, operation, modification, and decommissioning of the systems. …

… Under the proposed rules, petroleum products and their derivatives include methane,ethane, propane, butane, gasoline, kerosene, fuel oil, synthetic oil, crude oil, and liquified petroleum gas (LPG) …

In New Jersey, there are six excavated rock caverns that store liquefied petroleum gases, specifically propane and butane. These caverns were permitted by the Department, known then as the Department of Conservation and Economic Development, as authorized by the Act. Five of the caverns are in Linden and were constructed in 1957, at the Bayway Refinery, then owned by the Esso Standard Oil Company. The caverns received operation permits in 1959 for the storage of propane (two caverns) and butane (three caverns). These caverns still store the same products for which each was permitted. A sixth cavern was constructed between 1966 and 1968 in Gibbstown at what was then DuPont’s Repauno works. It originally stored anhydrous ammonia. This cavern received its construction and operation permit in 1965. The Department issued a permit modification in 2016, to allow the cavern to be repurposed to store butane. While there is ongoing Department oversight with the existing permits at these facilities, these proposed rules establish regulations, considering current engineering practices and environmental conditions, to ensure that existing systems and any new cavern systems that are constructed will be operated and maintained in a manner protective of public health, safety, and the environment.

Don’t be fooled by the exclusion of storage of LNG. The DEP proposal would allow underground storage of fracked natural gas, which can easily be converted to LNG for export.

Given NJ’s proximity to major reserves of fracked gas in the Marcellus shale, huge and growing gas demand, well developed pipeline network, and coastal location ideal for LNG export, this rule proposal obviously provides the regulatory framework for a huge expansion of gas infrastructure.

This is exactly the kind of “predictability” and “regulatory certainty” financial investors and the fossil industry desire (see: Principle #6 on “regulatory capture”). Underground storage capacity also supports the “reliability” (real time balance of supply/demand) and need to meet “peak demand” sham justifications for natural gas. Look at the national picture and note the location of underground storage to fracked gas production:

[Note: And don’t think Gov. Murphy’s Energy Master Plan or off-shore wind program will reduce growing natural gas demand – just the opposite. As I’ve written many times, off shore wind is dependent on natural gas. California regulators’ capacity analysis reveals this in their finding: (on page 493, 527, and 530)

After reviewing the DEP proposal, I now realize that the corruption involved with the DEP permitting of the proposed Gibbstown LNG export facility is even worse than I had imagined. I must admit ignorance of the DEP’s prior 2016 permit for an “underground storage cavern” for the gas butane. – or the existence of the “caverns in Linden”.

Recall that, after the stealth DEP permitting of Gibbstown LNG export was publicly exposed and generated a firestorm of protest, that Gov. Murphy publicly claimed that he opposed the facility and would do everything in his power to stop it. NJ Spotlight recently reported that the project was “on hold”.

But now, instead of killing the project by revoking previously issued DEP permits, Murphy’s DEP is proposing new rules that would allow new facilities and expansion and renewal of DEP permits for underground caverns, including for storage of butane at the proposed LNG export Gibbstown plant site, as well as 5 other existing “caverns”.

Everyone knows that the Biden Administration is seeking major expansion in the export of LNG to Europe to replace Russian gas.

Still, it is shocking to learn that at a time of climate emergency – which has prompted proposals to ban new construction and phase out existing fossil infrastructure and when states like California are learning about the risks of underground storage of natural gas, i.e. the Aliso Canyon disaster – that self described climate “leader” NJ Gov. Murphy’s administration is proposing new rules to expand storage of fossil fuels, including natural gas, in underground “caverns”.

The Murphy DEP proposal is directly linked to the proposed LNG export terminal in Gibbstown NJ at the former Dupont toxic site.

The Gibbstown LNG linkage is why the proposal was authorized and approved by DEP Deputy Commissioner Moriarity and not DEP Commissioner LaTourette, who legally represented that project and was forced to recuse himself from any involvement.

The proposal requires a “climate change impact assessment”. That assessment is the basis for DEP permit review:

But there are serious flaws that render this a totally meaningless exercise and expose the whole enterprise as sham:

1. DEP admits that the climate impact assessment is not enforceable and that there are no requirements to implement “any measure”:

2. the impact assessment is designed specifically and only for “climate change resiliency” (adaptation), not greenhouse gas emissions or meeting the emissions reduction goals of the Global Warming Response Act:

Among other flaws, on “climate adaptation”, the DEP tips their hand on the upcoming claim PACT land use regulations, by requiring consideration of the outdated and totally inadequate 100 year storm event:

The climate driven sea level rise standard is stronger, but it would not apply to Gibbstown location:

The complete environmental impacts that must be assessed are found on page 98-101.

The climate impact assessment requirements are found on page 104-106. (N.J.A.C. 7:1F-2.4). The “climate change impacts” are specified there. They are not what you might think.

Climate change impacts do not include the climate impacts of greenhouse gas emissions from or associated with the facility.

The “climate change impact statement” and DEP permit review provisions of the proposal lack any standards to deny a permit on the basis of climate impacts.

Here is the DEP’s lame attempt to obfuscate that reality:

DEP Claims To Lack Legislative Authority To Regulate Land Use To Prevent And Reduce Wildfire Risks

DEP Doubles Down On Flawed Strategies of Burning and Logging Forests

DEP Abdicates State Responsibility Via Delegation To Local Governments

DEP actually supports new development in extreme wildfire hazard areas

On the heels of the Highlands Council’s denial, in a Friday afternoon news dump, today the DEP denied my petition to force the Department to address climate induced wildfire risks in various DEP regulatory programs, including the land use programs.

As I wrote yesterday, the main objectives of filing the petition were, among other things, to:

to raise public awareness of the issues of climate, wildfire, and land use.

to pressure the [DEP] to adopt a policy of managing wildfire risk – primarily if not exclusively – through land use and development controls and fireproofing existing structures, instead of the damaging “active management” of prescribed burns, “thinning” and forest “treatments” (logging).

Finally, I had hoped to generate some pushback to DEP’s attempts, in their Forest Action Plan, Natural And Working Lands Strategy, and other “Forest stewardship” initiatives, to using wildfire risks as pretext for logging. (for recent examples of that abuse, see:

• Murphy DEP “Forest Action Plan” Sparks Controversy Over Conflicts With Climate Goals And Logging State Land

• Murphy DEP Caught Blowing Smoke On Wildfires

In denying the petition, the Department failed to engage the land use issues and instead doubled down on and defended exactly the flawed management strategies I opposed.

I was stunned that the Department wrote to deny legislative authority to consider wildfire risks in DEP’s land use regulatory programs:

While the Department has considerable authority to regulate certain activities in particular environmentally sensitive areas, the Department does not possess the sort of master land use planning or regulatory authority alluded to by Petitioner. In the particular areas over which the Department has regulatory authority, the development of many land areas that may be susceptible to wildfire is already minimized under the Department’s regulation of impacts to natural resources such as wetlands, threatened and endangered species habitat, coastal areas, riparian areas, and certain forested areas. As discussed below, the Department is engaged in an ongoing analysis of wildfire risk in the state and is developing information and tools to reduce wildfire risk and mitigate wildfire hazards to the maximum extent possible. 

DEP expressly limited their jurisdiction to:

regulation of impacts to natural resources such as wetlands, threatened and endangered species habitat, coastal areas, riparian areas, and certain forested areas.

Perhaps DEP failed to understand that the petition explicitly linked wildfire risks to impacts on DEP “regulated features“, i.e. the natural resources DEP noted above.

Clearly, there are scientific and legal nexus between land use, wildfire risks, and DEP regulated features. DEP is simply in denial about those linkages.

Later, the Department contradicted this denial of legislative authority to regulate land use, and concluded that land use restrictions are “unnecessary”

As such, the Department has determined that the requested rulemaking to prohibit or restrict development and mandate building retrofits is unnecessary. Nevertheless, the Department remains committed to continued research, as well as monitoring and reducing wildfire risk through both direct action and work with community partners.

I immediately wrote DEP to request that they clarify this fundamental legal issue, with a copy to Senator Smith requesting that he sponsor legislation to close that legal gap.

The Department then doubled down on controversial flawed, destructive, and ineffective DEP management strategies that rely exclusively on burning and logging forests to prevent and reduce wildfire risks:

Among the available forest management techniques are treatments to remove hazardous fuels and brush by thinning overstocked forests or creating fire breaks, as well as prescribed burning.  Id. at 35-36. The Department also utilizes prescribed burning for public safety and wildfire control.  See Forest Action Plan at 134-135.  

The Department admitted the huge risks of new and existing development in extreme wildfire risk areas.

But DEP then defended their current policy, which effectively abdicates State responsibility by delegating primary risk reduction strategies to local government.

Notably worse, the local strategies do not include land use controls under the NJ Municipal Land Use Law.

Thus, while DEP is fully aware of risks, by regulatory abdication DEP effectively actually supports new development in extreme wildfire hazard areas.

DEP wrote:

The Forest Action Plan recognizes that “[a]s the population in New Jersey continues to spread into the wildland or increase the amount of Wildland Urban Interface (WUI), community planning or the protection of both lives and property from wildfire is an unremitting challenge.”  Forest Action Plan at 133. One effective tool to address this challenge is a network of Community Wildfire Protection Plans (CWPPs).  Ibid. CWPP development focuses on restoring and maintaining landscapes that are resilient to fire-related disturbances, fire-adapting communities so that human populations and infrastructure can withstand a wildfire without loss of life and property, and engaging all jurisdictions to “participate in making and implementing safe, effective and efficient risk-based wildfire management decisions.” Ibid.

I need to do additional research on how DEP responded to the air pollution related issues, which are complex. I will note now, however, that DEP failed to mention recent NJ State legislation that exempted prescribed burns from DEP air permit requirements, as well as recent EPA Guidance regarding emissions inventory and reporting of controlled burn and wildfire emissions.

So, to summarize:

While the Governor and Murphy DEP tout their “climate resilience” leadership and regularly emphasize the risks of wildfires and the significant increase in those risks due to the climate emergency – and DEP even admits the significant increase in those risks due to existing development and burgeoning new development in extreme wildfire hazard areas – they are unwilling to regulate land use and development to mandate reductions in those risks.

Similarly, they abdicate the State responsibility and role in wildfire risk reduction strategies via delegation to their local government “partners”.

We’ll have more to write about this after we more thoroughly digest the DEP denial document (I hav an email version, no links, provided upon request)

Murphy DEP Tries To Take Credit For RGGI Funding For Carbon Sequestration

DEP’s “Active Forest Management” And “Forest Stewardship” Programs Do No Inspire Confidence

Prior Billionaire Funding To DEP & NJ Audubon Creates Huge Conflicts Of Interest

As part of their Earth Week media blitz, last week, DEP issued the following press release:

• MURPHY ADMINISTRATION CELEBRATES EARTH WEEK WITH NEW $15M INVESTMENT IN NATURE-BASED INFRASTRUCTURE THAT WILL HELP NEW JERSEY FIGHT CLIMATE CHANGE

As Earth Week is celebrated this year with the theme of Invest in Our Planet, the Murphy Administration is launching a new blue and green carbon grant program that will invest $15 million in projects across New Jersey that create, restore and enhance salt marshes, sea grass beds, forests and urban parks that sequester atmospheric carbon in the fight against climate change.

The DEP called this a “new program” and created the impression that this is new money.

The “new program” claim is flat out false and the implied new funding claim is highly misleading.

The source of the funding is the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) carbon sequestration program.

That program and funding are not new.

They were created by the 2007 legislation – See DEP’s “RGGI Strategic Funding Plan”, specifically P.L. 2008, c. 340, commonly referred to as the Global Warming Solutions Fund Act. The Act allocates 10% of the total revenues from the RGGI allowance sales to DEP for, among other things, “forest stewardship” and “carbon sequestration”:

Ten percent [of RGGI revenues] shall be allocated to the department to support programs that enhance the stewardship and restoration of the State’s forests and tidal marshes that provide important opportunities to sequester or reduce greenhouse gases.

DEP adopted/updated regulations to implement the law in 2019 Global Warming Solutions Fund rules.

This is another example of how “good news” grant funding is used by DEP to divert from real climate problems, feed the media stenographers and manage the news, while marginalizing critics .

Specifically:

• the paltry RGGI allowance price is not even 10% of the “social cost of carbon”
• the RGGI program has not reduced greenhouse gas emissions (Gov. Christie was right on that narrow issue)
• the current RGGI emissions “cap” is 30% ABOVE current emissions and is not a true “cap” (“In 2020, RGGI-covered power plants emitted 73.7 million short tons of CO2 compared to a RGGI cap limit of 96.2 million short tons of CO2.” (NRDC)
• the current RGGI program is under review and renegotiation, ostensibly an opportunity to fix these huge flaws
• there are NO NJ BASED PARTICIPANTS IN THIS RESTRUCTURING OF RGGI [Correction: One group from Middletown]
• the flawed RGGI universe of regulated sources and emission targets formed the basis of the DEP’s flawed CO2 emissions rule proposal
• RGGI applies to a very narrow universe of GHG emission sources, a very small percentage of total GHG emissions, and does not address environmental justice or local impacts.

In addition to these climate and RGGI diversions, three potentially problematic things in that press release caught my eye:

1) John Cecil, former head of NJ Audubon’s “Corporate Stewardship” program and champion of controversial logging projects has been promoted to Assistant Commissioner. Cecil has been an aggressive advocate of “active forestry management” (logging). That means he has even more influence on DEP land management and forestry programs.

2)  Private landowners, like billionaire Peter Kellogg – a friend of Gov. Murphy – who owns elite Hudson Farm hunting club and who funded $330,000 to NJ Audubon’s “active forest management” and “Stewardship” programs run by DEP’s Assistant Commissioner Cecil – are eligible for funding:

• Private landowners owning property in New Jersey (note: private property project applicants must provide matching funds)

Kellogg’s Hudson Farm has not only funded NJ Audubon logging projects, but Kellogg also funded a DEP staff junket. Those DEP staffers will make grant funding decisions.

Even more troubling, he is invested in and using Hudson Farm to generate revenues from private market based carbon trading schemes. Fake credits, double dipping, and all sorts of abuses and manipulation opportunities – like DEP allowed to occur in the “Open Market Emissions Trading Program” (OMET) – are likely.

Obviously, both DEP and Mr. Cecil have huge potential conflicts of interest, should Hudson Farm apply for DEP grant funds.

3) The DEP press release used a new and vague term for projects eligible for funding:

Eligible projects include those that:

• […] Restore degraded forests or former agricultural areas with resilient native vegetation

I’ve asked DEP press office how DEP defines a “degraded forest”. That vague term is not used in the 2007 enabling law, DEP’s RGGI regulations, or DEP’s strategic funding plan. I’ve not seen it used in various DEP “Forest Stewardship” plans.

After several days of getting the runaround, I sent DEP press officer Larry Hjana this note:

Are you aware that DEP has found lack of “age class diversity” to be a condition that requires “active management” and “treatments” (logging) to restore forest health and ecological diversity?Is DEP taking a similar approach to carbon sequestration?

Then you wonder why DEP gets questions about what they consider a “degraded forest”?

I’ve never seen that term used before in various DEP forestry documents. Yet DEP is offering millions of dollars in grant money to address the condition. 

How can DEP evaluate grant proposals without a technical definition and performance metrics?

Sensing a new sham basis for more “active management” and “forest treatments”, I then filed this OPRA request:

I request the following public documents:

1. the grant application definition, application evaluation guidelines, and performance metrics for the field, forest, and ecological conditions that would constitute a “degraded forest”;

2. DEP regulations, technical manuals, guidelines, policies, plans, projects, standards, metrics, or other materials that define a “degraded forest”;

3. the scientific basis to support DEP classification or determination of the existence of a “degraded forest”

We’ll keep you posted. This smells like the same old sham and spin.

NJ Senate Environment Committee Chairman Runs Away From His Own Climate Bill

Fossil Corporate CEO’s Given A Propaganda Platform And Praised

Climate Activists Are Passive, Clueless, And Evasive

Yesterday the Senate Environment Committee met to hear testimony from “invited guests” on climate adaptation (see my set up story where I outlined the key issues).

I have been unable to access the hearing audio tape on the NJ Legislature’s website – I either lack the software or a fast enough internet connection to listen, so, I don’t know what went down.

But Tom Johnson of NJ Spotlight covered the hearing, and his story today is really a perfect example of how and why the climate emergency is not being taken seriously in Trenton and many other places. Unfortunately, I have to rely on that coverage.

So, let’s take a look and highlight the most egregious abuses and name names.

1. Corporate Fossil CEO’s Are “Invited Guests”, Given a Propaganda Platform, and Praised

What NJ Spotlight called “a trio of energy executives” were “invited guests”: Ralph Izzo, chairman, CEO and president of the Public Service Enterprise Group and Robert Pohlman, a vice president of corporate strategies for New Jersey Resources, the owner of New Jersey Natural Gas (it was not reported who was the third of this “trio”).

They are given a platform and uncritical coverage by Spotlight to spout their misleading and self serving corporate propaganda. Izzo even got a paragraph subheadline: “Izzo’s five steps for NJ”

(none of which “steps” included stricter regulation or mandates to replace or supplement the current policy, which is limited to corporate subsidies and incentives. And the cynical support for a price on carbon was truly disgusting).

“Coincidentally”, just 2 days prior, Tom Johnson wrote a gag inducing fawning piece on Mr. Izzo’s career and retirement.

Just coincidentally, of course, just like this was a “coincidence”:

Coincidentally, the state Department of Environmental Protection announced Thursday the allocation of an additional $6 million to offset the purchase of electric trucks in vulnerable communities.

If you think either of those events was a “coincidence”, you need help (just like it is a “coincidence” that PSE&G funds NJ Spotlight and several lame environmental groups).

In contrast to this disgusting Trenton corporate lovefest, when even the moderate corporate Democrats in Congress seek testimony from fossil industry executives on climate issues, it’s not to provide them a propaganda platform and to praise them.

And even the lame corporate media tries to hold them accountable.  Examples of the typical recent storyline, which have only gotten worse with skyrocketing gas prices – and corporate profits:

• NY Times: Oil Executives Grilled Over Industry’s Role in Climate Disinformation
• LA Times: House panel plans to subpoena oil companies as executives are grilled on climate disinformation
• Washington Post: Big Oil CEOs testify before House Oversight Committee
• BBC: Climate change: Major US oil companies face grilling by Congress

And many people view NJ Spotlight as a “progressive” news source. Tom Johnson is cynical and should have retired a decade ago.

2. Chairman Smith Ran Away From His Own Climate Bill

If you read the NJ Spotlight headline (“policy change in the works” – “previews bill”) and the Spotlight story, you could only think that new climate legislation is pending –  as in the future:

By the end of the year, the chairman of the Senate Environment and Energy Committee hopes to have a bill ready that will outline new policy directions to fight climate change in New Jersey.

But the fact is that Senator Smith already introduced major new climate legislation, S1602.

That bill would put teeth in NJ’s Global Warming Response Act and make the emission reduction goals enforceable in DEP air permits.

As I wrote in my set up story:

Curiously, Chairman Smith has yet to post his own GHG emissions reduction bill, co-sponsored by Senator Greenstein, S1602, which “Authorizes regulation of greenhouse gas emissions under “Air Pollution Control Act (1954)” and “Global Warming Response Act. (for analysis of that bill, see:

• Senate Environment Committee Chairman Smith Introduces Legislation To Put Regulatory Teeth In The Global Warming Response Act

Senator Smith apparently refused to even mention that important bill. He ran away from his own bill!

NJ Spotlight failed to report on that important bill.

We have a longstanding pattern of failure that can not possibly be an oversight: they never reported – for 15 years – the legal fact that the Global Warming Response Act goals are aspirational and not enforceable. They never reported on my repeated calls on Smith to put teeth in the law. And they never reported when the bill was introduced in February.

Climate activists apparently failed to even mention, never mind support, that important bill. Instead, they repeated their campaign talking points calling for a moratorium on new fossil infrastructure and for DEP to deny permits on pending new fossil projects.

Of course, the corporate executives didn’t mention that bill in their corporate spin.

Yet, without the legislative authority in that bill, the emission reduction goals of NJ’s Global Warming Response Act will remain aspirational and not enforceable.

DEP will be unable to deny permits for the major new fossil infrastructure and enforce a moratorium on major new GHG emissions sources that the climate activists targeted.

NJ needs a real climate law, like New York State, see:

• NJ Climate Activists Are Being Misled On How To Kill Proposed New Fossil Projects

3. NJ Spotlight is Misleading Readers About Growth In Greenhouse Gas Emissions

According to a recent Empower NJ Report, the Murphy DEP has approved permits for major new GHG emissions sources that have increased GHG emissions by 19.3 million tons, or about a 20% increase in total Statewide emissions.

But NJ Spotlight ignored that.

NJ Spotlight not only ignored that, they reported exactly the opposite: that emissions have declined:

New Jersey has reduced greenhouse-gas emissions by 20% below 2006 levels since it adopted the Global Warming Response Act in 2007, but it is far short of the 80% drop in carbon emissions the law targeted by 2050.

After giving corporate fossil CEO’s a platform to spew their propaganda, and failing to accurately report critical facts, NJ Spotlight closed the story with this “balance”:

But Ken Polsky (SIC) and Anjuli Ramos-Busot, both representing Empower NJ, urged the committee to refrain from promoting those fuels as a waste of resources, saying they would continue to exacerbate the impacts of climate change.

As it has lobbied for the last couple of years, Empower NJ wants the state to ban new construction of fossil fuel projects. Polsky and Ramos-Busot urged the Murphy administration to prevent seven current seven fossil fuel projects from being approved and built.

In a scathing recent press release, Empower NJ blasted the Gov., see:

• EmpowerNJ Analysis Shows Murphy Administration Not Serious About Climate Goals

NJ Spotlight whitewashes that criticism.

And no one is even talking about the facts that NJ laws to promote and require renewable energy are not linked to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. Gov. Murphy’s Energy Master Plan’s renewable energy goals are in no way linked to reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The Gov.’s off shore wind renewable energy has not and will not displace fossil fuels.

As currently designed and under current laws, renewable energy will primarily if not exclusively serve growth in electricity demand and not displace fossil power (mainly gas fired power).

For a solid analysis of how renewables serve new demand growth, see:

• Energy transitions or additions?  Why a transition from fossil fuels requires more than the growth of renewable energy

Since all this is well known, the failure to mention any of it amounts to cowardice – and that is astonishing in the face of the accelerating climate emergency and obvious failure by State leaders.